Finn's Closet
by korel.c
Summary: Puck and Kurt sit in a dark closet with a shaft of light beaming through. These are their conversations and silences. Puck/Kurt, fluff, Closet!verse.
1. Finn's Closet

**A/N: **Puck/Kurt fluff! Fluffity fluffity fluffity happy bunnies and fluff! No, not bunnies, bunnies are like plot bunnies and they _bite _but happiness and frolicking in meadows! Closet!verse, awkwardness, kissing. And an awkward Puck comment.

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**Finn's Closet

* * *

**

Finn's closet is dark, dark, dark. Kurt crosses his legs tighter against his body, and brushes his hand through his hair. He rests his head on the closet wall with a thump, and closes his eyes. It's not like he can see anything, anyway.

The air is musty, with mildew and mothballs prevailing over the scents of everything else. The flannel fabric hangs down, the corner of it touching the side of his head, and Kurt takes a deep breath, breathing in Finn's scent. A part of his contemplates how much his life had changed. A few months - a year - back, he would have been out of his mind with excitement, because this was Finn's shirt. Something that Finn had touched, had worn, his crush had worn. Now it was...just ugly, pretty much. Kurt shook his head and shrugged, sighing.

"Penny for your thoughts?"

Ah - and the other reason...

Puck is sitting in the closet with him, his long legs stretched out in front of him. For a moment Kurt is aware of the warmth at his knees; their knees are touching. Actually, Kurt is sitting in between Puck's legs. Uh - why was the air so hot, again?

There is a shaft of light coming from the hinges of the shut door. The shaft of light throws a golden rectangle up against the back of the closet, and Kurt runs another hand through his hair in anxiety. It's become a sort of tradition, for them to sit together in an enclosed space. Something a bit like meditation; they both need it - it came from Puck's counselling, somewhat. He remembers that the first time they tried it, they nearly eviscerated each other. Puck was stronger. Kurt had more makeshift weapons. Puck tries to hide the bruises made by hanger whipping for a week afterward.

Still...alternate times, alternate territories. Today is...somewhat more neutral. So they're in Kurt's house, but they're not in his room. The silence is comfortable, at least.

"Penny for your thoughts?"

"Oh-oh," Kurt says, shocked out of his reverie. "Y-yes? Sorry, I was thinking. Um...it's...just thinking about what we're doing, I guess." He looks straight at Puck, where Puck would be in the darkness.

"Oh," Puck says. A sound of shifting, and Kurt's knees burn as Puck's knees move against them. He's probably adjusting position. The clattering of hangers and flannel helps that impression.

The silence that follows it is a good deal more awkward. Breathe, Kurt tells himself. Breathe and the awkwardness will pass over. Breathe.

He breathes.

Puck sighs and rests his head on his fist. It's...different, being with Kurt like this. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees fingers flash through the rectangle of light. Then a hand, a wrist, and an arm.

Puck looks away from the cupboard door and reaches out with his own hand, looking at where Kurt would be, where Kurt is offering his compromise, his gesture. Their hands meet. He tangles their fingers together. Holding on to Kurt's hand, Puck looks away, licking his lips and staring at the door again.

Kurt breathes deeper. It's becoming more usual, that Puck holds on to him. He can help Puck through his problems with his mother's drinking, he knows, just by being there for him, being confident, helping him. Listening to him talk, letting him be silent. Letting him take it one step at a time.

A gust of wind makes the closet door sway open a little bit, flooding the closet with light. Kurt looks at the side of Puck's head, and follows his steady gaze to match the wall with his own.

Puck turns his head back to watch Kurt. They look at each other for a still, comfortable moment, and laugh nervously. Kurt is the one to let go of Puck's hand first. The door sways shut again. Darkness falls.

Both of them drop their hands back into their laps. The ensuing silence is angular and very awkward.

"So," Puck says, as Kurt says, "Yeah."

They both laugh awkwardly and fall silent again.

"I was just thinking-" Kurt says, pressing his head back against the wooden wall. "These are Finn's clothes. A year ago, I would've been beside myself with excitement, being near so many of Finn's clothes. And now...I couldn't care less."

He pauses, waits for Puck's response. When Puck's comes, he doesn't disappoint.

"A year ago..." Puck says, clears his throat, starts again. "A year ago, I was throwing nerds into dumpsters. And though my mom was drinking now and then, she still paid attention to me. Now she...she doesn't."

"I pay attention to you, Puck," Kurt says. Puck smiles briefly. His hand lifts from his lap before he forces it back down again.

"Yeah. Thanks."

Kurt scoots forward until their noses are touching, then kisses him on the lips.

Puck doesn't kiss back, but he doesn't push Kurt away, either. Kurt counts this as progress. And it's lovely progress.

The silence lengthens. Kurt kisses him again, again, and this time they linger.

Kurt breaks the kiss eventually, drawing away until only their breaths mingle.

Somewhere under them, a faint voice calls, "Kurt! Kurt, where are you?"

"You know," Puck whispers, "Lions hump for dominance."

Kurt's eyes go wide, and he scoots further back.

"What brought that on?" Kurt asks, backpedalling faster until his back hits the opposite wall. "Are you seriously asking whether you can hump me?"

"No! Nonono, I-I-I didn't mean that," Puck stutters out. "I really didn't mean that!"

"Then what did you mean?"

"Uhh..."

"It was a plea for space, wasn't it?" Kurt says, understanding. "Okay, I'm sorry. I shouldn't've pushed."

"No, I mean it's, ... I didn't mind. It's alright, Kurt."

"Okay. Good."

The silence stretches out again, and Kurt leans back and closes his eyes.

The silence gains corners and quickly turns rather awkward. Their knees touch again, and begin to slide against each other.

"Unh," Puck grunts. Simultaneously, Kurt says, "Yeah."

The silence lengthens.

"So-uhh, what should we do now?" Puck turns his head back away again, watching the door.

"Well-" Kurt begins.

Puck overrides him. "To think that the great Noah Puckerman has the only gay boy in Ohio between his legs. How the mighty have fallen." His voice is anything but rude; if anything, it's a little bit self-deprecating.

"And he's enjoying it," Kurt says.

Puck kisses him this time, and Kurt's expression goes blank. As Puck breaks the kiss, Kurt breathes, "Noah."

Moments later his eyes snap open and he curses. "I'm sorry, N-Puck. I meant, I didn't, it just...it just slipped out!"

Puck grins. "Ha - I've still got it. It's okay, Kurt."

Feeling awkward from all of that emotional bullshit, Puck turns to face the closet doors again.

This means that he's the first one to see when the closet doors open, and Burt finds them.

Puck's eyes widen. Burt's eyes widen. Puck hisses, and Kurt turns to look. Kurt's eyes widen.

"You know," Burt says, "I could make a reeeeeeeally terrible joke right now, but I'm not going to. Partially because you're in Finn's closet, Kurt, and I don't want to think about the symbolic implications of that, and also partially because I love you. Not you, Puck. Kurt."

"Thanks, Mr Hummel," Puck says, his face twisted into a grimace.


	2. Puck's Closet

**A/N: **Another closet!prompt by and for my muse. I keep wanting to make closet jokes but they are inherently unfunny. And the symbolism keeps killing me. But funny! Also, lack of capitalization is intentional. Spelling mistakes are not. Alerts and favorites would be nice, reviews nicer (since the hits page is currently down). Yay for suggestions!

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**Puck's Closet

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**

the closet is dark, dark, dark, and it's cramped so tight that puck isn't sure that he and kurt can fit in it. unless they're scrunched up together, so close that their chests are touching. and their lips are touching. yeah. he can live with that.

another bottle smashes on the wall and cascades down in clatters and splinters and glass and sarah sobs herself, flinging herself on her big brother instead and burying her head into his shoulder.

unfortunately now it contains both him and his sister and he's pretty sure he doesn't want sarah to see what he wants to do to kurt...or how much he wants to do kurt.

"shh," he says. "you're safe here." he's not entirely too sure of that but he makes sure to sit with his back to the closet door. The door's not wide enough or high enough that if his mom tries to go hunting for them she will hit him first.

he holds on to sarah tightly and shuts his own eyes. this will be over in a few hours.

"noah?" sarah asks and she is the only one to ever, ever allowed to call him this. his mom gave up the rights when she started drinking again, and his bastard of a father can go rot his bones in hell. "can you text kurt?"

"whaa?" puck says. "why?" he's thinking that it's a good idea, but it's also a bad idea because he doesn't want kurt to be targetted even more even if it's only by a drunken woman with bad aim and worse weaponry.

"because you like him," sarah says. "and...i want to see you happy."

"back at you, sarah," noah whispers, and kisses the top of her head. she holds tight to him.

the shouting increases outside and this time noah makes out his name and 'disappointment' and several swear words in one sentence and 'just like his father' and is puck again.

"so?" sarah says. "text him."

puck sighs. "alright. i will."

he fakes it first, typing in the letters all exaggerated so that sarah can see, then quickly shuts the phone without hitting the send button.

"see?" he says. "done."

he thinks the reason that he doesn't want to get kurt exposed in this is because he doesn't want to see kurt hurt even further. he knows, deeply, that he doesn't want to be exposed to kurt knowing that he is exposed to this so much of the time.

"gimme the phone!" sarah says, and wrestles with it, puck moving it away from her in the confined space. his back bangs against the closet door twice, and he freezes.

"Where are you, you disjointed freaks! I know you're there...just like your father, you are. both of you, the whore and the punk...I know what you get up to, I'm not stupid. Noah! get down here and take it like a man! A proper man!" steps on the staircase, stomps and sobs, broken and painful and more sobs, a creak on the stairs and his mom stops on the fourth stair and weeps. a glass bottle tumbling and clinking down the stairs until it shatters at the bottom.

noah freezes and puck freezes and sarah doesn't freeze, lunging for his hand and grabbing the phone off it. puck presses his head to the door and listens for any sound of his mother any further.

sarah edits the message until the semi-casual invitation to come over (complete with caveats like - 'but of course you're busy, right?' - and - 'you don't really need to come over') with 'please please please come' which she figures her brother would never send but that's what she's feeling right now so he can suck it.

she sends it while her big brother is still listening at the closet door, her head pressed into his chest. she can hear the sound of his breathing and the steady pump of his heartbeat against hers. the stomps up the staircase toward them raise her heartbeat, make it speed up, until her heart and his aren't in time anymore.

she hates her mother sometimes. sometimes she loves her. mostly she doesn't know what to feel anymore. but noah is nice. he plays with her, sits through her brushing his hair and drinking from the teacups with the dolls, keeping her from falling off the trees she climbs and turning off the tv when her eyes start watering. even though ben 10 is so good. ...suck that, mom.

sarah breaks off into little, stifled, sobs, and noah runs his hand through her hair.

"sing me a lullaby?" sarah asks, her breathing shallow.

noah kisses her on the forehead. "sure."

"-somewhere over the rainbow..."

he is quiet so his mother won't find him.

"WHERE ARE YOU? Come out! Come out! Come out like your father did! Did you run away! Did you?" her voice goes straight through the closet door, the semi-coherent rage, the slurring, and the sobs. noah cradles his sister into his arms.

"Are you in here? Here? HERE?" his mother says, stumbling into each room and leaning on the lintels. "Where are you hiding?"

noah is not going to tell her. definitely not while his sister is in his arms, and sobbing again instead of sleeping.

* * *

kurt saunters up the driveway to the puckermans', outwardly confident and inwardly ill at ease. that message didn't sound like puck. it also didn't sound like things were too good right now.

he eyed the front door. more than that, he eyed the broken bottle lying within inches of the front door.

not good.

his eyes slid to the side.

there was a tree. good.

pity he was wearing van kamp, though.

* * *

kurt heard the shouting when he was midway through shimmying up the tree. slowly, he shifted until he was behind a patch of leaves, less visible from the windows.

using the skills learned from months of bullying, he plotted out his route to puck's bedroom window, using the leaves as cover.

then moved.

the window was surprisingly easy to unlock. and the branches that he took nearest to it were surprisingly scuffed. no...unsurprisingly so.

"Show yourself, you little sluts! You too...manslut...manwhore...just like your fucking father...that lazy layabout with nothing to his name...like you! Like YOU!"

when he crouched at the edge of the windowsill, he scanned Puck's room. typical male; albeit one with slightly better interior decoration since he'd gotten to him. kurt hadn't understood his fascination with cheap, easily replaced furniture at the time, but now he wished he hadn't pressed.

"noah?" a small voice said from the closet. "i'm scared."

kurt rubbed his face. of course they would be in the closet. of course.

* * *

the door opens and puck clutches his sister tight, rolling himself over her and making sure that if his mother knocks him out she won't be able to get to sarah. light floods over him, or would if the figure wasn't blocking the doorway. strange...his mother smells like flowers instead of alcohol, sweet clear perfume.

"...puck?" kurt asks, quietly, and shuts the door behind them.

he sidles over to the other side of the closet, grimacing as he looks at the few clothes hanging on the railing.

"do you honestly only own two pairs of pants?"

"three. i'm wearing one right now."

"oh. ...i hadn't noticed."

the silence in the air is thick with more than dust.

kurt slides down the wall to sit, his legs crossed, and in instants sarah is on his lap, wrapping her arms around him. she buries her head into his chest.

kurt is sure he has a confused look on his face but hugs her back.

"what-" he says.

"my mother," puck says, hating himself because his voice cracks and puck's voice never cracks. "she...you heard her, i guess." he swallows back the lump in his throat.

he's sure kurt would be giving him an aghast look right now, but the closet is even darker than finn's. there's almost no light except for under the door, which is a thin band that puck's butt absorbs. he can't see kurt.

he can feel kurt when kurt pats his hand, though.

"i'm sorry. should i not have come?"

"you smell nice," sarah says sleepily.

"thank you," kurt says, and kisses her on the forehead.

"you like puck," sarah says, and puck freezes. there's shifting from the other side and puck just-is-embarrassed beyond belief because-

"i...i like puck?"

"no," sarah says. "i mean, you're like puck! listen a little better, wouldja? sheesh."

puck's face falls and a tug at his chest lets him know noah's disappointed, too.

"oh, i'm sorry, miss sarah," kurt says, and tugs on her ear. sarah gives a little squeal. "so how am i like puck again?"

"well, you're funny," sarah continues, into the darkness and the clean sharp smell of kurt's chest, only a little wider than hers, "and you're smart and noah keeps talking about you when he plays with me and you know how much puck likes talking about himself."

kurt represses a snort, but what comes out is still recognizable as one and puck glowers at him in the dark. and possibly at sarah, too.

"he talks about you all the time," sarah says earnestly. "about how he thinks you're pretty and-"

kurt makes another strangled noise. Then another. "sarah, what are you doing?"

"trying to taste you," she says, all innocent, "because my brother said you tasted good too."

kurt and puck both make a strangled noise this time. "um..." kurt says. "that's...that's not how he meant it."

"oh. how did you mean it then, noah?" her voice says through the darkness and puck makes yet another strangled noise that sounds more like 'ggggfffrggghkk' and kurt laughs under his breath.

"never mind," puck says firmly. "and stop talking, sarah."

"he thinks you're really pretty," sarah confides to kurt, and then there are the sounds of shifting and sarah whispering something he can't quite catch and kurt's hand is on his, his fingers tracing the back of puck's knuckles, sending tingles and sparks, hot and true, up the back of his spine and his mind, the back of his mind, is demanding that he have gorgeous amazing hot makeouts on kurt's side of the closet. he reaches out and-

"noah?"

...oh. right. shouldn't be...shouldn't be doing this in front of the sister.

"yes, sarah?"

"i love you."

puck slumps, utterly defeated in his quest to have hot kisses by kurt in a very small closet where their chests and...other things...could be toucning lots. noah takes over.

"love you too, sweetheart," he says, his voice tender.

kurt's mouth is open. he has never heard puck like this before. he has been vulnerable sometimes with kurt, but never...never loving. not like that. and so help him, he wants to hear that tone, directed toward him. a tone...just for him. something special.

puck's hand finds his, and they tangle their fingers together, holding on tight to each other for support.

"sing me a lullaby? the one you were singing?" sarah asks.

"of course," puck says, still in that tender tone. no - not puck. noah.

"-where troubles melt like lemondrops, way above the chimney-tops..."

kurt hums into the harmony of that, not soaring high like he could, because this is about puck and sarah and nothing at all about him.

downstairs the crashing continues and the shrieking is about coherent, until the front door opens and slams shut and the sound of the car starts up.

"why...oh why, can't i," puck sings and his voice is shaky, a little breathy, and kurt covers his voice, keeps it going until sarah is fast asleep against his shoulder.

puck pushes the closet door open with his hand and they are both still shadows to each other, only to kurt and to puck, the other is outlined by light.

* * *

"why did you never tell me?" kurt whispers, his voice soft instead of accusing.

"i didn't want you to know," puck says quietly, but squeezes kurt's hand, ever tighter.

* * *

"he thinks," sarah had whispered, pressed up to his ear with her hand over her mouth. "that he's not good enough for you."

puck?

not good enough for him?

so he reached out with his hand, to find puck's, and let him know that he really was good enough, and when he figured that out and was ready, kurt was waiting for him.


	3. Kurt's Closet

**A/N: **Apologies for the delay. For the muse, but she knows this already. I don't own Glee.

* * *

**Kurt's Closet**

**

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**

dark, dark, dark.

sleep deprivation.

light.

more light.

more sleep deprivation.

Maybe it was all in his head.

The blue light peeking between the hinges on the closet door was significantly more blue than anything Kurt Hummel had ever seen before.

What they were not seeing was each other. As usual. Since they were in a closet again. And the light only came through a very, very narrow slot, that provided no other illumination whatsoever.

This time though, at least it was a decent-sized closet; Kurt's, actually. It was a Very Large Closet (Kurt had begun ranking closets according to size, Puck and him were in them so often). It fit them both with their legs outstretched, their shoes just barely touching. It was a very large, full closet. The clothes that hung down got in the way, ruffled up Kurt's hair, would have ruffled up Puck's if he'd had any besides the strip in the middle.

"So," Puck said, turning away to stare at the blue light. Kurt pressed a hand to his forehead and stroked his temples, warm fingers contrasting against the faintly cool haze that floated somewhere in front of his eyes. Sleep. Fatigue. Sleep deprivation. Hazy. Yep. Hazy.

"I guess I'm supposed...to talk?"

"Yes," Kurt said, quietly, and pressed his back against the wooden surface of the closet wall. His clothing hung above the two of them, the vests and the shirts and the scarfs with their beautiful, designer brands; Dolce and Gabbana, and oh, he even admitted to owning some of the shirts that Klein designed. Yes, it shrieked gay, but it was comrfortable, dammit.

"According to the therapist, you have a high chance of going on a further bullying rampage, and it is in my best interests to get you out of it, since I'm going to be the one in the way."

Puck sighed and scratched his head. "...The 'professional' therapy you managed to get me out of by saying you'd counsel me, sure," Puck said. "And how much fun have you been having? First you get...me...and then you get my axe-crazy mom."

"And then I get your cute little sister," Kurt countered, and ran one hand through his hair, his elbow brushing against the nice, tight, mildly-patterned shirts (micro-stripes, barely even visible, but providing good texture to contrast a scarf with thick width-wise stripes.) The leather pants, oh, he almost gasped at the sheer awesomeness of the tight leather pants. though he had to admit that they fit like they were painted on, but weren't _nearly _as easy to get on in the first place. "And your cute little sister tells me a secret and I think I'm gaining progress."

"Yeah," Puck said, and scowled. "Don't trust my sister."

"What," Kurt said, "That she said that you said I was _pretty_, that I was _smart, _that I was gorgeous beyond belief and you only wanted to take me? ...Hard?" He clapped a hand over his mouth, his eyes mockingly wide and shocked, and slowly lowered his hand, licking his lips (and his hand) in the process. Puck's legs tensed, from what little he could see in the dim light.

Puck slowly turned purple (red, he supposed, had the closet not been excessively blue), the heat in the closet rising another notch. Kurt's lips quirked upward. "Oh, yes, like I'd protest that."

Puck coughed and grew even purpler. "Which...part?"

"Oh, of course the handsome, good looking, et cetera et cetera part." Kurt flapped his hands, making sure to make use of as much of the wrist-bending as possible. Making a point, making a point. "...What other parts were there in there?"

"None," Puck said firmly. "Yep. None at all. Just that one. Yep."

"Oh?" Kurt said, leaning forward and tapping his nose. "So you really do think I'm pretty?"

"Er," Puck said, pressing his back into the wall, looking cornered. "No comment."

Kurt grinned.

Then leaned forward, tucking his knees under him and pulling up into Puck's personal space. He ran his hands up Puck's legs, very gently, and moved forward until he was practically kneeling on Puck's lap.

"How about from this distance?" Kurt said, his breath falling gently on Puck's shoulder. Moments later, he stuck his head onto Puck's shoulder and nuzzled into it. Yes, that skin was truly soft. And quite muscular, they lay underneath the skin. And Kurt just knew that if Puck so much as flashed his guns at Kurt, every piece of resistance he had as a last-ditch defense against jumping Puck was going to make a leap for the side of the moon. Which made no sense. Guhhh...he hated sleep deprivation.

And yet. And yet it was absolutely the best thing to have done, in order to keep the dragon - sorry, Mrs. Puckerman - from going all _berserk _and "What happens when you parade a man in clashing colors in front of fashion critics or anyone with real taste - " otherwise known as a **RAGING FURY OF DOOM AND DEATH****.**The point was, it was a big she-bang as his father would put it and it hurt.

Somehow, along the way, Puck had had a thought, one goal that he had to achieve. That point had vanished. Oh, well, he could always focus on the other boy in the closet, Kurt, with his smoking pale blue shoulderblade, exposed under his nose and his lips and tongue and that curiously weak sleeve, and just give a little bit of touching time - he was sure that Kurt was suffering exactly the same amount of sleep deprivation as he was, unless Kurt somehow slept less due to all the busy-beavering he had to do to get his 'fashion' - his 'look' up, in the morning. He'd slept with girls into the same fashion as Kurt, so he knew exsactly how long they took to do makeup, co-ordinate outfit, and all of that other silly things - note, junk.

Mm.

Kurt smelt good. Kurt tasted good. Man, it was like being drunk except without all the throwing up at the end. That was, fucking epic and amazing. With more epic. And more amazing. And MORE EPIC AND MORE AMAZING AND MORE EPIIIIIIIICCCCCCC AND MORE AMAAAAAAZING, and after that it just got illegible to think about.

He'd fucked a girl once when he was feeling sleep deprived. Man, that was so fucked up he really, really needed to try it again. Orgasm time was one of the most fucking times...he wondered if Kurt, when he took him from behind hard...yes, he was thinking about the possibility now, would be just as deprived and have an equally tripped out experience.

Hell, now that he was feeling fine about kissing him fi-mmph. Mmph.

Mmphhhhhmm...

Someone should really have told him that apparently Kurt Hummel was an AMAZING kisser. Better than Santana, even, even though Kurt didn't own a pair of amazing, firm tits.

Right. Sleep deprivation. He should probably get some sleep after Kurt and him duked out their last remaining issues.

Wait, Kurt was talking?

And, oh, crap it was cold.

"I'm not sure we could do anything right now," Kurt said. "And you're lucky we're in my room instead of Finn's, because if Finn saw us in the closet, you know what he'd say."

"I know what he wouldn't say," Puck said, and ground his fist against his hand.

Kurt rolled his eyes. "You're so predictable. But fine, what he wouldn't say. We can't talk out our issues tonight, though, since you were so kind as to sneak back into my house past midnight and I haven't slept yet because you refuse to talk and you refuse to let me sleep!"

Puck cast his gaze downward, at the ground where their sneakers were touching, and then looked back up.

"I needed some time away from my mom. And some company. And I don't know, I just don't talk that much."

"Aaaah!" Kurt whispered, and smashed the back of his head quietly against the closet wall. He shook his head frantically.

"Fine, then we're just going to talk about the first things that come into our heads, no matter how completely out of the blue it sounds."

"You're just as trippy as I am?"

"Normally I wouldn't put it this way, since I am a terribly formal person, all the better to keep distance from people, but yes, I am very trippy."

"Distance?" Puck asked. "Why would you want to have distance?"

"Distance is both figurative and literal. Why would I want to get close to a jock when they'd push me into a locker or slushie me? And the same thing applies to getting close to any jock any other way."

"...Oh," Puck said, scratching his head. "I hadn't realized that it had gotten so bad."

Kurt rolled off Puck slowly, shuffling backward until his back hit the wall on the opposite side. In the dim but brightening light, Puck looked at him. He looked back. They both cast their gazes to the floor nearly simultaneously.

Kurt turned slowly to watch the blue light coming through the door. The blue had slowly began to lighten, until it was more of a kind of teal, a teal that turned everything teal with it. The starting calls of the birds outside, the cries, their songs, began to twitter. One of the neighbours' dog began to bark.

"This is all within a dream," Puck said, holding his hands to his forehead. "A dream within a dream within a dream within a dream within a dream within a dream within a-"

"Pfff," Kurt said. The haze of incomprehensibility took him, the sleepiness rushing to his head.

The conversation degenerated from there.

"I hold forth on great authority that Miss Rachel Berry is a turd meant to be crushed under my overwhelmingly powerful heel."

"You mean like that football kick? Dude, how did you ever manage to do that?"

"Practice in kicking balls, Puck."

"...Oof."

"Balls are spheres which are stars in the firmament of the existing universe."

"You sound like Sam."

"I don't look like him, do I? Tatertots forbid, as Mercedes would say. His hair is so amazingly dyed - who has that shade of blonde hair normally anyway? No one, that's who."

"So you're saying," Puck said with spaces between words, his head starting a hang low, "That you're critical of Sam Evans because you think he's attractive."

Kurt's head snapped up. "What? How could you say that?"

"Your...criticalness...is all about his hair, which unfortunately is what girls fall over him for. You, like, focus entirely on his hair instead of him, so you must kind of like him."

"Noah Puckerman," Kurt said, "Just because you're that kind of shallow and like pulling on pigtails and pigs' tails and other things doesn't mean that I am. Shallow. Like that. I mean."

Puck stared at him.

"...Fine, yes, he's attractive. Except for the hair. That shade of blonde would only work on certain types of people, and it is not him."

"Oh yeah? So who's shade of blonde-I can't believe I'm saying this..."

"Quinn's is fine," Kurt said, ignoring Puck's little catch of breath. "Brittany's fits her terribly well. Oh, not the vacancy or whatever other blonde stereotypes there might be, but the kind of facial structure she has fits blonde very well. If she were brunette, she'd look like a blowup doll."

A corner of Puck's mouth lifted, and his eyes momentarily went blank.

"You are a sick, perverted, disgusting bastard and I hope you burn in hell," Kurt muttered under his breath.

"What?"

"Uh, nothing."

"Didn't sound like nothing, Kurt. Sounded like a lot of insults, actually," Puck said, smirking a little wider. "Hey, lemme tell you, I'm not interested in blowup dolls, unlike...Artie, I guess."

"Hey," Kurt said.

"Sorry," Puck said. "Easy target."

Kurt looked down.

Puck shifted around in his seat. "Uhh...I didn't mean that. Just...wanted...to...get out of an uncomfortable situation, you know?"

Kurt gritted his teeth and looked away.

* * *

The light was getting brighter, slowly; the teal until a cyan, the cyan until a pale, pale blue, the color of ozone-covered sky, the faint pastel-purple. The birds outside started up their calls and the dogs from the opposite house as well as their neighbours started up the answer. Kurt winced.

"Shit," Puck said, the first time either of them had said anything in a while. "I screwed that up, didn't I."

Kurt looked at him and folded his arms.

"Fuck." Puck ran his hand through the strip of hair on his head. "Fuck."

* * *

An engine roared before it settled down into a quiet sort of rumbling in their garage. Kurt reached out and pulled the door shut all the way, until only a little bit of light peeked through, and only between the hinges.

"...Truce?" Puck asked.

His answer was a very quiet snore.

Puck closed his eyes.

The light was an almost solid gold, it fell directly on his face, the clothing brushing him was itchy, and the snoring was getting unbearable.

Puck opened his eyes, reaching out with one hand to find the source of the snoring. Oh, wait. Of course it would be Kurt. Who else would it be? Finn? He snorted quietly.

"...Elbow..."

Puck blinked. What? Elbow? What? He hadn't pegged Kurt for a sleeptalker, before. He winced as the snore came back, twice as loud.

"...Your cucumbers are dry..."

Puck reached out in the darkness and pushed Kurt over gently, rubbing at his mouth with the back of his arm as he did. Odd, he could've sworn that sometime in the night before Kurt had kissed him, but it must have been a very strange dream.

Yes. It was a strange dream. Because their times spent in the closet were always in darkness. And he'd been able to see Kurt's face at that time.

Must have been a dream.

Yep.


End file.
